Interview with King Kraken by Matt Bladen
MoM: Give us an introduction to the band for anyone that doesn't know you. Band name, members, style etc?
King Kraken: Hey we’re king kraken from South Wales, we are a heavy rock/metal band with giant riffs, bigger drums and in your face vocals, we’re a 5 piece band consisting of Adam Healey on lead guitar, Pete Rose riff master on rhythm guitar, Karl Meyer on bass, Richard Mears on drums and Mark Donahue on vocals, we’re signed to Metal Rocka Records (an offshoot of Off Yer Rocka Records)
MoM: Elephant in the room. How have you coped with the pandemic? What have you been up too?
King Kraken: The pandemic has hit us hard as it has the whole music industry, February last year we played in front of 800-1000 people in Birmingham O2, it felt like things were going well for us and we had a lot of bigger gigs planned for the rest of the year and the month after we were all stuck in the house because of lockdown, so it’s been difficult to say the least but we’re the same as many others and just can’t wait until things go back to normal safely, which looks to be in a difficult situation at the moment with Covid regulations grassroots venues not able to get enough people through the door to make it worth while putting a gig on, grassroots music venues have been hit hard so many of them are not going to be coming back when things go back to normal.
As to what we have been up to, not too much as much of the year we haven’t been able to do a lot except writing new songs online which is a strange thing because songs written online don’t sound the same when u get into the practice room, which we have found out. Since we’ve been able to practice again we have tried to cram in as much as we can having 2 Practices a week to try and get back on track and learn to replay our old songs as well as writing our new stuff, which is sounding great and were looking forward to recording our 1st album which is nearly finished.
MoM: Give us an introduction to the band for anyone that doesn't know you. Band name, members, style etc?
King Kraken: Hey we’re king kraken from South Wales, we are a heavy rock/metal band with giant riffs, bigger drums and in your face vocals, we’re a 5 piece band consisting of Adam Healey on lead guitar, Pete Rose riff master on rhythm guitar, Karl Meyer on bass, Richard Mears on drums and Mark Donahue on vocals, we’re signed to Metal Rocka Records (an offshoot of Off Yer Rocka Records)
MoM: Elephant in the room. How have you coped with the pandemic? What have you been up too?
King Kraken: The pandemic has hit us hard as it has the whole music industry, February last year we played in front of 800-1000 people in Birmingham O2, it felt like things were going well for us and we had a lot of bigger gigs planned for the rest of the year and the month after we were all stuck in the house because of lockdown, so it’s been difficult to say the least but we’re the same as many others and just can’t wait until things go back to normal safely, which looks to be in a difficult situation at the moment with Covid regulations grassroots venues not able to get enough people through the door to make it worth while putting a gig on, grassroots music venues have been hit hard so many of them are not going to be coming back when things go back to normal.
As to what we have been up to, not too much as much of the year we haven’t been able to do a lot except writing new songs online which is a strange thing because songs written online don’t sound the same when u get into the practice room, which we have found out. Since we’ve been able to practice again we have tried to cram in as much as we can having 2 Practices a week to try and get back on track and learn to replay our old songs as well as writing our new stuff, which is sounding great and were looking forward to recording our 1st album which is nearly finished.
MoM: What experience have you had with Bloodstock/M2TM in the past?
Our experience in 2019 was a great one, we wasn’t very well known at the start and our 1st heat and we got through on a wildcard to the next round, which we were crazy happy about because nobody knew us, as time went on and Round 2 came around we had people wearing our t shirts buying CDs which was crazy, we got through Round 2 and into the semi final then the final and we were gobsmacked to be there, it was an amazing night the place was packed to the rafters, I’m not sure what we came in the competition but it didn’t matter we had such a great few gigs with M2TM it was just a great start to the band, 2020 speaks for its self and hopefully 2021 will go ahead in some capacity,
MoM: How are you feeling entering this slightly restructured M2TM format?
King Kraken: It’s going to be a bit of a struggle for everyone I feel this year, not long to learn to play together as well as what we did before the pandemic, finishing writing new songs, which is expected of us as we’ve had a year off, we are not going to come back with nothing new, biggest issue is we can’t play our new songs to any crowds before hand to see Which ones are crowd favourites and which ones are not, we’ve never been very good at picking songs by ourselves and go on how we feel a crowd reacts but we are not going to have that luxury this year.
MoM: What would it mean to play Bloodstock? Would it be more significant doing so this year, after everything that's happened with live music?
King Kraken: It would definitely feel like an achievement of getting through the year and a bit of the pandemic and still being a band after it, it’s been very difficult having faith in what your doing when you can’t do it, sometimes I've forgotten I’m even in a band, so if we pulled it off it would be a big achievement for us personally and recognition that we still have what it takes to play to a bigger crowd, I think our pants would be collectively brown to say the least as playing to a bigger crowd is a big step up after being off for so long!!! I think playing this year would be a massive achievement as you would be playing with the cream of the crop of British bands at the moment
MoM: Give us a three word rundown of what to expect in your performance?
King Kraken: Half And Half ... we’re doing just that for our set at M2TM South Wales, we released Chaos Engine EP in August last year when we got signed and got to play it to nobody and we don’t want people to forget those old/newer songs that we had back then as we didn’t do anything with it, but we’re also playing 4 new songs that nobody has ever heard before outside of the band so it will be very interesting to see how those songs go down for sure, we think their better than the old stuff but how do we tell when nobody else has ever heard them, so it’s definitely going to be interesting for sure, Thanks for the opportunity to do the interview and not forgetting about us!
Final Thought: The lean green metal machine are back in business, watch out for those tentacles!
Our experience in 2019 was a great one, we wasn’t very well known at the start and our 1st heat and we got through on a wildcard to the next round, which we were crazy happy about because nobody knew us, as time went on and Round 2 came around we had people wearing our t shirts buying CDs which was crazy, we got through Round 2 and into the semi final then the final and we were gobsmacked to be there, it was an amazing night the place was packed to the rafters, I’m not sure what we came in the competition but it didn’t matter we had such a great few gigs with M2TM it was just a great start to the band, 2020 speaks for its self and hopefully 2021 will go ahead in some capacity,
MoM: How are you feeling entering this slightly restructured M2TM format?
King Kraken: It’s going to be a bit of a struggle for everyone I feel this year, not long to learn to play together as well as what we did before the pandemic, finishing writing new songs, which is expected of us as we’ve had a year off, we are not going to come back with nothing new, biggest issue is we can’t play our new songs to any crowds before hand to see Which ones are crowd favourites and which ones are not, we’ve never been very good at picking songs by ourselves and go on how we feel a crowd reacts but we are not going to have that luxury this year.
MoM: What would it mean to play Bloodstock? Would it be more significant doing so this year, after everything that's happened with live music?
King Kraken: It would definitely feel like an achievement of getting through the year and a bit of the pandemic and still being a band after it, it’s been very difficult having faith in what your doing when you can’t do it, sometimes I've forgotten I’m even in a band, so if we pulled it off it would be a big achievement for us personally and recognition that we still have what it takes to play to a bigger crowd, I think our pants would be collectively brown to say the least as playing to a bigger crowd is a big step up after being off for so long!!! I think playing this year would be a massive achievement as you would be playing with the cream of the crop of British bands at the moment
MoM: Give us a three word rundown of what to expect in your performance?
King Kraken: Half And Half ... we’re doing just that for our set at M2TM South Wales, we released Chaos Engine EP in August last year when we got signed and got to play it to nobody and we don’t want people to forget those old/newer songs that we had back then as we didn’t do anything with it, but we’re also playing 4 new songs that nobody has ever heard before outside of the band so it will be very interesting to see how those songs go down for sure, we think their better than the old stuff but how do we tell when nobody else has ever heard them, so it’s definitely going to be interesting for sure, Thanks for the opportunity to do the interview and not forgetting about us!
Final Thought: The lean green metal machine are back in business, watch out for those tentacles!